ABSTRACT
We are the beneficiaries of almost one and a half centuries of research in organic chemistry. The accumulated output of that effort is an enormous body of data collected in a vast literature. It is estimated that well over half a million articles (papers, patents, books, etc.) are published each year and the volume of publications will probably continue to rise. Searching such a huge body of work is a formidable problem, but it must be emphasized that the time spent reading the literature is often more than repaid by the experimental time saved as a result.
